VADER - SEPTICFLESH - DEVIAN - INACTIVE MESSIAH

25 years and not a bit quiet yet... yeah, you could not even call VADER quiet at all. Especially this year the Polish guys are touring restlessly to have celebration concerts for their 25th anniversary with all their fans in every corner of this planet.
The European Tour is going to be ended soon and of course the band was honoring „the“ metal location of the Ruhr-Area called Turock. So everybody, who was there to join the Birthday party of VADER over there, was able to enjoy a fantastic European Metal-cocktail with such bands as VADER – SEPTICFLESH – DEVIAN – INACTIVE MESSIAH and some might have enjoyed some other cocktails maybe... ;)

To tell honestly I unfortunately missed the first few songs of :: INACTIVE MESSIAH ::, but when I finally arrived among the audience the Greek band surprised me with their saucy and rocking sound. Not only Death Metal, but a balanced mixture made of metal riffs, blast beats, rock attitude and orchestral samples. Last ones were just playback – unfortunately no keys on stage, but they fitted in perfect harmony to the live-played music. Remembering that they were the first support I have to say the guys seemed to be relaxed and experienced and had a lot of fun while playing their set – guess this is the result of the fact that recent tour was already going for over a month and the Greeks have gotten more experienced by some other tours before, too. Well, the audience was pleased with the performance though some die-hard Vader fans might have thought they were a bit too soft for this billing. I truly liked their subliminal rock-sound. And though the southerners probably are used to some much hotter crowd, INACTIVE MESSIAH got a lot of applause from the German audience, which often is considered as way more „difficult“ to elate.

As a second band of the evening :: DEVIAN :: were befalling the audience. Yes, I mean it; you really can say they befall the audience! I truly do not know where the guys still stored so much energy since the tour already was going on for a pretty long time already. It simply was incredible to see the energy raising that high on stage which for sure infected the audience as well immediately. Just like a heavy and dangerous thunder-storm their joy for playing discharged and an enormous blast was rolling over the crowd. The incomparable entertainer-qualities of vocalist Legion (ex-Marduk) were indeed a pure joy to watch. He often did some German announcements, which scarcely anybody (expect him) understood remembering the question marks in most of the faces around me, but Erik seemed not to care and had a real fun up there on stage... You really got the impression he would have preferred to perform among the people than up on stage, because most times he was standing that damned close to the edge as even possible. The audience really thanked it DEVIAN by all means and were moshing and headbanging very enthusiastic to the brutal riffs DEVIAN offered. Especially partying where the people to the new songs from DEVIAN's latest issue Ninewinged Serpent that is out on Century Media. This one is musically far apart from what Legion and Emil did during their time with Marduk. DEVIAN put the heat on the spectators by using elements taken from Death, Thrash and a bit of Black Metal combined with typical Heavy Metal parts. Nobody was able to elude the catchy melodies and riffs. Simply an awesome performance with a lot of energy and movement on the stage and at the end of the show Legion left the stage and was walking around through the crowd to farewell the fans personally. That has brought them some more sympathies than they already collected on this evening – mine is guaranteed for sure!!! ]:->

The style of the next band :: SEPTIC FLESH ::, confidently can be described as way innovative, I would say. It was the second band from Greece on the billing and it seems as if the Greek have a soft spot for orchestral playbacks. With help of such recordings they created a very own atmosphere in the club. But I have to say you should have to like it or be open-minded to feel like this. The perceptions of the audience where tearing apart concerning to this. Nevertheless, the mood was not influenced badly by it and so the party went on, 'coz lots of people seemed to be there just for seeing SEPTIC FLESH. So it happened that after their show a run on their merchandise began – maybe the fans were still paralyzed by some of the hypnotizing and slight psychedelic rhythms... who knows? ;) Considering the tempo and comparing it with Devian the Greeks slowed down a bit until they announced the song Communion from their new release with the same title. WOW! I just was able to rescue myself with a huge jump to the right side from the moshpit that suddenly seemed to be everywhere...

Apparently endless was the alternation and soundcheck for :: VADER ::. Until finally everything (including the square meter of carpet for Peter) was prepared you could hear different speaking choirs demanding „VADER! VADER!“ Finally the show started. And how it was due for a 25th jubilee tour of band they started right out of the band's history with the song Dark Age taken from The Darkest Age (1993). Everybody tried to push in front of the stage and it was getting really cramped. And while among the first songs such as Chaos and Silent Empire were played the mood of the audience reached a damned hot boiling point. Unfortunately the band had some technically problems with the drums, but Peter took it very cool „We would not be VADER, if there would not be problems with the fucking drums...“ and none of the fans resent them for it. Further on they played without any problems and when Peter asked the audience: „are you afraid of the night?“ it was pretty predictable for every fan in the crowd that the next song was going to be Shadowfear. Before the show hot discussions among the die-hard fans in the first row were dealing with the question whether the Polish guys will perform the apparently most demanded song of the evening or not. Yeah! finally the tones of Helleluyah were pitched and as a crowning final of a damned good and enjoyable show VADER regaled the spectators with Wings. As an addition they performed some newer stuff with This Is The War und Lead Us (both songs from The Art Of War 2005) two absolutely great and absolute appreciated hits. And thus it ends... and though I left my place in front of the stage sweating all over and my hair-dressing in a total mess by headbanging all the time along the gig, I whish it would have started once more... haha, by the way I cannot swear it, but maybe during the show they played one of the Slayer cover songs VADER is also famous for ;) :P
Setlist: Intro, Dark Age, Vicious Circle, Chaos, Silent Empire, Epitaph, Carnal, Black To The Blind, Shadowfear, Sothis, Reign Forever World, Reborn In Flames, Crucified Ones, Helleluyah, Fractal Light, Wings // This Is War, Lead Us